NewsWrap
for the week ending August 2nd, 1997
(As broadcast on THIS WAY OUT Program #488,
distributed 08-04-97)
[Compiled & written by Cindy Friedman, with thanks to Brian Nunes, Graham
Underhill, Rex Wockner, Lucia Chappelle & Greg Gordon, and anchored by Cindy
Friedman and Frank Stoltze]
Shane Harte and Noel Byas celebrated their union in late July in what's
believed to be Ireland's first public same-gender wedding. One nightclub
owner refused his space to them after learning the nature of the affair, but
they were welcome at Dublin's Kitchen cafe, which is owned by the rock band
U2. The two men dressed as sailors for the five-minute ceremony, and were
attended by a drag queen and a bridesmaid wearing gold netting.
In Australia, New South Wales Member of Parliament Clover Moore introduced
a measure to legally recognize same-gender couples, only to draw fire from
those it was intended to benefit. Activists in the state believe her
proposed "recognized partnerships" would represent what they called a "third
rung on the ladder" of a relationship hierarchy, and would rather work for
status identical to that of unmarried so-called "de facto" heterosexual
couples.
Also in Australia, the general secretary of the Uniting Church has issued a
statement clarifying that ministers and senior lay leaders are free to design
ceremonies for same-gender couples, "as long as they don't purport to say it
amounts to marriage." This was believed to be a response to the right wing
National Action group's charges that what they called "pseudo marriage
services" for gays and lesbians had been conducted by Reverend Dorothy
McRae-McMahon. She's the second-highest-ranking officer in the Uniting
Church's national hierarchy, and came out as a lesbian at the church's recent
national General Assembly.
The Georgia lesbian who lost her job because of her wedding to another
woman has been denied the chance for a hearing before a federal appeals
court. Attorney Robin Shahar saw her offer of a job in the office of
then-state Attorney General Michael Bowers withdrawn after he learned of her
impending private commitment ceremony. Although a three-judge panel of the
11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals first made a ringing declaration of
Shahar's right to intimate association, the full court reheard the case and
ruled against her. Because Bowers had cited the need to maintain his
office's credibility in enforcing the laws of the state, including its sodomy
law which he successfully defended before the U.S. Supreme Court a decade
ago, Shahar had hoped to reopen the case based on his recent admission of
having violated the law against adultery over a ten-year period with a woman
who at first was one of his employees. This week, the appeals court judges
decided 9-to-3 that it was too late to introduce the new evidence of a double
standard in Bowers' office, given their doubts that the evidence was either
relevent or strong enough to change their earlier decision. Bowers is
currently a Republican candidate for governor of Georgia.
A Virginia Court of Appeals panel this week opened the door for visitation
by lesbian co-parent April Wade with Tyler Doustou, the son of Sharon
Bottoms. Because Sharon Bottoms is a lesbian, custody of Doustou was given
to her own mother Kay Bottoms in a notorious decision upheld by the Virginia
state Supreme Court. In the last round of the continuing legal battle,
Sharon was allowed to have Tyler visit her in her home, but Wade was denied
any contact with him whatsoever, as Henrico County Circuit Court Judge Buford
Parsons applied a decade-old precedent involving a gay father and his
partner. The appeals court found unanimously that that precedent had been
misapplied and ordered Parsons to reconsider the case. It's the first
instance in which a higher court in Virginia has explicitly ruled that sexual
orientation per se should be irrelevant in visitation determinations ... but
its effect is likely to be short-lived: Kay Bottoms is planning an appeal to
the same state Supreme Court that upheld her custody of Tyler.
Zimbabwe this week was the site of the fourth biennial
African/African-American Summit, and one of the delegates named by U.S.
President Bill Clinton was Keith Boykin, executive director of the National
Black Lesbian and Gay Leadership Forum. Although the U.S. Embassy to
Zimbabwe succeeded in convincing most of the delegation to soft-pedal the
question of human rights abuses there, Boykin urged them to take a stand on
behalf of gays and lesbians. He also took the opportunity to meet with the
group Gays And Lesbians of Zimbabwe and said he was inspired by their courage
in struggling for justice in the face of resistance at every level of
society. He also met with Zimbabwe High Court Justice Mahomed Adam to
discuss the nation's anti-gay laws.
Openly gay alleged multiple murderer Andrew Cunanan was not infected with
HIV, according to three unnamed law enforcement sources in Miami Beach,
Florida. It had often been theorized since early May that Cunanan began the
series of five murders he's accused of, out of revenge for having been
infected. The test results following his suicide July 23rd are officially
being withheld from the public under the state's AIDS confidentiality laws.
Canada's Toronto International Film Festival is honoring the gay-themed
film "The Hanging Garden" by scheduling its world premiere to open the
festival's Perspective Canada sidebar in early September. The directorial
debut of Thom Fitzgerald depicts a young gay man's return home to Nova Scotia
after a decade away.
In other entertainment news, openly gay actor Patrick Bristow, who plays
the continuing gay character "Peter" on ABC's sitcom "Ellen", will be phasing
out of that show to star in one of his own in the new season. In UPN's "Head
Over Heels" he'll be playing a video dating service counselor who's become so
jaded by a done-it-all sexual history that he's now chosen celibacy -- a move
that neatly avoids any concerns about openly gay physical displays of
affection.
Also welcome in U.S. TV is the news that filming has actually begun on the
long-awaited sequel to "Tales of the City", the miniseries realization of
open gay Armistead Maupin's long-running newspaper serial that set ratings
records when it played on PBS in 1994. The sequel "Armistead Maupin's More
Tales of the City" will pick up where the original left off, in the year
1977, and will have many of the same actors.
Meanwhile, comic and film star Eddie Murphy has dropped his
5-million-dollar lawsuit against the tabloid "National Enquirer" for its late
May story headlined "Eddie Murphy's Secret Sex Life -- His Transvestite
Hooker Tells All". Murphy had charged that the "Enquirer" had knowingly
published material it knew to be false, but now says they did so "without
malice". Murphy had previously settled out of court his parallel lawsuit
against another tabloid, the Florida-based "Globe". Both stories were
follow-up's to the early May arrest of a tranny sex worker who was arrested
on outstanding warrants while riding with Murphy in his car in a seedy
neighborhood during early morning hours. Murphy had not violated any laws in
the process, and claimed he was just helping out by giving a ride to a woman
who appeared to be ... confused.
Gay philanthropist Tim Gill, founder and chair of the giant software
company Quark, Inc., is leading the way in private contributions to aid
victims of devastating floods this week in Fort Collins, Colorado. Through a
project of his Gill Foundation called the OutGiving Fund, intended to
increase public awareness of the ways gays and lesbians support the larger
community, the American Red Cross has received $100,000 for flood relief,
half of it a dollar-for-dollar match for any Coloradan's private gift to the
cause of $250 or more. It's the largest private contribution to help out in
this disaster to date.
And finally ... the winner in the custom game category at the mid-July
Pinball Fantasy '97 convention in Las Vegas was "Go Girl!", the drag-themed
creation of openly gay San Franciscan Michael Brown. The player stands in a
pair of red metal stiletto-heeled shoes. To a disco beat, the ball is
launched past a "Ken" doll wearing makeup and a pink feather boa, through a
group of bumpers named for direct action groups including ACT UP and Queer
Nation, and towards drop targets depicting famous homophobes, including
Kansas' peripatetic picketer Fred Phelps, Lou Sheldon of the Traditional
Values Coalition, and U.S. Senator Jesse Helms. An on-screen drag queen
cheers the player on with remarks like "Go Girl!", "She is on fire!", or --
should a ball get past the flippers -- "It's always better the second time."
High scores stop the game while a series of wigs are displayed on a photo of
the player's own face, and once one is selected, another drag queen whispers,
"That's the biggest wig I've ever seen!"
--------*---------
Source for this week's report included: The Age (Melbourne, Australia),
Associated Press, London Times, Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, Pan-Africa
News Association (Dakar), Philadelphia Daily News, Philadelphia Inquirer,
Reuters, Richmond (VA) Times-Dispatch, Rocky Mountain News (Denver), San
Diego Union Tribune, South African Press Association, Sydney (Australia)
Sun-Herald, Washington Post; and cyberpress releases from Ground Zero News
(Colorado Springs), American Civil Liberties Union, National Black Lesbian &
Gay Leadership Forum, Gill Foundation, and Showtime.